Semantics: Terms and Conditions for Claiming Your Pearl
by thesocketpuppet
Summary: Lapis Lazuli wants Pearl, and has no idea what to do about it. (Lapis Lazuli X Pearl, one-shot, canonverse.)


Lapis Lazuli has seen lots of Pearls. After a while they're all the same gaudy ornaments, dressed in ruffles and shiny material. She supposes that's why Rose Quartz's Pearl appeals to her – because this Pearl alone holds a sword with the same aplomb as she would hold a plate while making dinner. Any other pearl would probably cry if they were told to hold a sword.

Lapis Lazuli doesn't lie to herself, not after spending an eternity in a mirror. She knows what she feels. She's thankful for the long years at court; they've taught her patience, the ability to compose herself. Pearl isn't hers to order if she has an itch to scratch, but damn, it burns even in the depths of the sea, as Lapis longs for someone to hold her.

 _Poor little water gem,_ she thinks of herself savagely as the current's pressure bears down on her, _poor water gem to want someone who isn't even at her level_.

 _Poor you, locked up in a mirror and set adrift in an ocean of stars, stuck on this sorry island, a backwater Earth waiting to burst._

 _/_

 _/_

Even a court gem slips up sometimes, as she does when she watches Pearl bake at the kitchen one day. Pearl notices, because it is a Pearl's nature to notice when they are wanted.

"Is there anything I can do for you?"

"Don't say that," Lapis mutters. "You sound like a pearl."

"I am a Pearl," Pearl says.

If you were a Pearl, Lapis thinks, I'd have you with me all the time. I'd have you explore me. I'd have you to explore. I'd use you up until I needed another novelty.

"You know what I mean," Lapis says.

"I do," Pearl replies. "And I am a Pearl. You need to stop thinking that I'm… something apart."

"Pearls don't get dirty."

"Well this one does," Pearl says, gentler now. Lapis doesn't like the tone. Or maybe she does. She's being spoken to as though she doesn't have the power to squeeze Pearl till she poofs and shatters. "Lapis," she says, earnest now, "Pearls are gems too, you know? What I do, any Pearl could do, if she wanted to."

She sounds like she's had to say this several times now. Lapis almost says, _dance for me, or bring me water, or come here,_ just to prove to Pearl that she's wrong, but she can't. Because what she likes about Pearl is that Pearl isn't like a Pearl! And now she's added a headache to the heartache that she feels when Pearl is around, but never hers to have.

"Ugh. Whatever!"

Lapis Lazuli departs, as though she can escape from orbit.

/

/

Pearl finds her at the galaxy warp. "You could be attacked here," Pearl says. "It's best to leave."

"Like you don't come here to stare at the stars."

Pearl doesn't respond, which irks Lapis. It reminds her of the vacant, acquiescing manner of a court pearl.

"I don't know…" Pearl says, as she sits down next to Lapis. "I don't know what to do when you get into these moods."

Lapis turns to look at her. Despite the destruction of the galaxy warp, the lights embedded into the ground still work, highlighting Pearl's high cheekbones, the blueness of her eyes, the paleness of her form. Seated perfectly still, with a composure more perfect than Lapis's, there is no doubting that Pearl will carry her past until whatever end the world has in store for her.

"Do you have a problem with me?"

"I don't understand. You're not… anyone's. You're free, but you insist you're a Pearl."

"What else would I be if I were not a Pearl?"

"Something better."

"Oh, I think I understand now. You think a Pearl is defined by her limitations. But everyone has limits, Lapis Lazuli, unless a gem is a diamond. We're not so different. You're just spared the tighter leash. Earth doesn't play by those rules."

Lapis wants Pearl, because Pearl breaks the rules. But without the rules, there is no chance for Lapis to claim Pearl.

"Then what rules are there to lay claim to a Pearl?"

"Whatever rules that Pearl sets," Pearl says.

Glaring at her, Lapis asks, "then what rules do you have?"

"That's what this is about?" Pearl looks at her then, which makes Lapis glare even more defensively. "You want… this form?"

"I want you," Lapis says, irritably. "And I've never had a problem with a Pearl until you. So. What are your terms?"

Pearl laughs. "Lapis," she says, "I'm sorry to say that I cannot give myself to you, under any terms." Pearl stands up, just as Lapis feels the crushing weight of her utter lack of power. "I'll give you some homework, though. You might even like it. You should watch Camp Pining Hearts with Peridot."

Pearl leaves her then, but the sound of Pearl's feet walking away from her rings in Lapis Lazuli's ears long after.

/

/

 _fin_


End file.
